Monday, 30 September 2013

I love how Lush's bath products all have different and unique 'themes' (is that the right word? I dunno, but I'm sure you know what I mean). The Fizzbanger is inspired by a combination of the BFG and a Catherine Wheel firework according to the Lush website - very random but intriguing! It was Craig who actually brought this home for me, I'm not sure I would have picked this one for myself as I usually lean more towards the pink and girly ones.

This smells of apple and cinnamon - and I love the smell of both these things! It doesn't contain any glitter like a lot of the other products, but I don't mind either way, it still turns a lovely bluey green colour and makes lots of bubbles.

Friday, 20 September 2013

I'm pretty sure I've sung my praises about Graze boxes a few times already. I've been ordering their snack boxes for a few years now, but now they've branched out into breakfasts and kids snacks.

I was very excited about this as having breakfast on top of my regular snack boxes delivered makes life with a three month old just a little bit easier. But I was also a bit apprehensive as I've tried porridge before and I wasn't a fan, however the first box is free so I had nothing to lose. The portions look tiny and I wasn't really convinced it was going to fill me up - if I even liked it - but I added a punnet and a half of milk and microwaved for two minutes as the booklet told me. The flavours these porridge's come in are all really lovely and not at all boring. My personal favourite so far is the apple and cinnamon - amazing. And also surprisingly very filling, so the breakfast club gets a big tick from me!

Monday, 2 September 2013

This weekend we went on a bit of a whirlwind trip to London. Craig and Danny were down there to DJ in Pacha, but after my parents told me I should have a break, we decided to make a weekend of it.

Now Flynn is sleeping through the night, he was ready for his first sleepover at nan & grandads. The first night away from your baby is hard. As soon as I got to London and we got to the hotel, I started to feel very sad thinking about Flynn and was seriously considering going straight back home! One thing I've started to realise is that as soon as you have a child, you a) never stop worrying and b) always feel guilty about having time away from them, and actually enjoying yourself without them there. After a little chat with Gemma (Danny's wife), who also has a little boy, I started to feel better and ready to make the most of the weekend. We were right next to the palace so we went for a walk down there, and managed to see a few more sights here and there. As for their set at Pacha, I'm not into house music but I really enjoyed their set, and they were asked to do another set towards the end of the night, so they did really well. All in all it was a tiring but good weekend!

Friday, 9 August 2013

I had Flynn seven weeks ago, and already he's smiling, laughing, 'dancing' (kicking his legs and waving his arms along to music - so cute) and reaching out to touch things. We're very fortunate that he's been able to tell the difference between day and night since about four weeks, so he's awake and alert the majority of the day and we don't usually have much bother getting him to sleep on a night. He's only been waking up once during the night, for up to an hour just to get a bum change and a bottle, for about two weeks. Although for the first couple of weeks it was a killer (especially because when he was a newborn he was waking two or three times a night) I'm used to it now and can function on a few hours sleep at a time.

I'm not going to lie, it hasn't been easy, but the good news is that it gets easier as time goes on. I suffered pretty badly from the baby blues for the first month. I felt like I was going crazy, but was assured it was normal and doesn't necessarily mean it's post-natal depression, and I've started feeling more like my regular self the last few weeks. It's hard to explain the kinds of emotions you go through after having a baby, but my biggest 'thing' was that I felt overwhelmed with all the attention, and I'd actually felt like that for the last few weeks of my pregnancy as well. I went to a big family party a few weeks before I was due and so much of the focus was on me and the bump that I had to leave, and this continued a few weeks after he was born. I regularly left the room when there were a lot of people around not just because the attention was a bit intense, but I also found it difficult to see Flynn being passed around a lot of people. He was all mine for nine whole months and now he was here I didn't want to share him! I still feel like this a bit, but have now let others take over to babysit, so I'm getting better.

I've always been pretty close to my parents but I'm definitely a lot closer to my them now, especially my mam after what we went through together. I feel very lucky that Flynn came into the world with just me, Craig and my mam in the room doing it together. Even Craig says he feels he's got a special connection to her now after that. I feel like I understand them a lot more too, I guess when you become a parent yourself you start to think a lot like them. I also cannot express how glad I am that my mam is an expert on babies and is always around to help, so that puts my mind at rest a lot! You hear so much out-dated advice from people as soon as you have a baby, it's reassuring to have someone who is actually kept up-to-date with what is safe and what isn't recommended for babies on the other end of the phone anytime you need them!Things are settling down a bit now that Flynn is in a good routine so I hope to be around a lot more!

Thursday, 20 June 2013

Before I say anything else, I'm just going to point out that whilst I don't want to scare any pregnant women who may read this, I am going to be honest and if you don't want to know about the details of childbirth then I recommend you don't read any further!

So the last time I updated I knew I was going to get induced just before 40 weeks due to baby's size. Last Thursday (13th), we went to the hospital to find out the plan of action. To try and start labour off, you're given two sweeps, two pessaries and then if none of them have worked then they get you on the drip. I had two sweeps, one on Friday and one on Monday, which resulted in me getting strong Braxton Hicks and signs that my body was preparing for labour, which didn't materalise into established labour. I was dilating a little but not progressing. Over that weekend I was on a mission to try and get myself into labour naturally, but no such luck and I just had to accept I'd be getting induced! I'd heard so many horror stories about induced births and how they're supposed to hurt so much more because your body isn't ready and hasn't had the opportunity to build contractions up, so I really wanted to avoid it. I was pretty upset when I was told I had to check into hospital on Tuesday afternoon for the pessaries to prepare my body for induction on Wednesday morning.

Tuesday afternoon me, my mam (who, for those of you who don't know, was delivering the baby) and Craig got to the hospital at 3:30. I got my pessary inserted at 4pm and Craig and I just hung out in my room. About twenty minutes later I started getting cramping, which I was told was normal, so I tried to ignore it and watched TV and had some food. By 7pm the pains were getting worse so I went in the bath for half an hour which helped - I do see why a lot of people go for water births now! But when I got out and back to the room is when things started to go downhill. The pain was spreading to my back and getting a little hard to take, plus visiting time was over at 8pm and Craig had to leave. My mam left at the same time and said she'd be back in an hour to check on me because she needed to go home to do some things. That next hour on my own was possibly the worst of my life, I must have pushed that orange button that alerts the midwives that you need something about 20 times! They gave me codeine and paracetamol and I kept trying the different positions they were showing me to help with the contractions but nothing was helping. The best way I can describe them is that I was splitting in two, my back was on fire!

So this is where I don't really remember very much - apart from the pain! As soon as I was allowed codeine again I pestered the midwife for another dose and I was pretty much out of it. I kind of did this on purpose as I know codeine makes me drowsy (pair this with the gas and air and I was in la la land, and I'm not going to lie, it was a nice place to be haha). My mam and a team of midwives found me slumped dramatically in my room, I could hear them saying I was 5cm already and that they'll get Craig to come back - he was only at home for an hour! I was then popped into a wheelchair and rushed to delivery. I don't remember how I got out of my clothes and into my hospital gown (I'm sure my dignity was probably lost somewhere during this process), I don't remember having any internal examinations and I don't remember getting my waters broke. I dozed off for most of this stage of labour thanks to the codeine.One thing I do remember is getting the drip put in and the epidural. I hate needles but I'd been told a few times that when the time came I wouldn't care what they did to me - they were right! Even though I was stabbed all over my hands and arms as the lady failed to find a vein, it still didn't hurt. Then my hero the epidural man vowed to end my suffering and he did. I only knew that he was putting the needle in because Craig and my mam were telling me I was doing really well and gripping my hand! I didn't actually really feel anything. You get a clicky thing to top up the epidural yourself and once I maxed that out and at 10cm three hours later, he came back to give me another lovely big dose to keep me going through the birth.

This took all the pain away completely and that was when I started to perk up and could stop using the gas and air. I spoke to Craig probably for the first time since he burst into the delivery room a few hours earlier and then I started feeling the urge to push. At 12:45 it was just me, Craig and my mam in the room and she said if I was feeling the urge to push then we should get going, so I just bore down whenever I felt the urge to and pushed when she said I was having a contraction. Craig had said all the way through my pregnancy that he was staying at the waist up and didn't want to see anything - he was standing at my left leg while my mam was holding my right one watching the whole thing! I knew he would!

The pushing part was actually the best part of the whole labour for me - my pain was gone, and it was just us three in the room with no screaming (from me) or chaos, and the fact that I knew it was almost over probably helped! 25 minutes of pushing later Flynn popped out and I finally met the little person who'd been kicking and wriggling around in me for so long! He was a little slow to start as the cord was wrapped around his neck so needed some oxygen, it felt like a lifetime before we heard that first cry but in reality it was probably only a minute or so. It was lovely when he was handed back over and he was looking up at me and grabbing my finger, I couldn't (and still can't) stop staring at him!

Finally, mam assessed the damage 'downstairs' and thankfully I didn't tear or need any assistance with delivery so my recovery shouldn't take very long at all. I have a lot of muscular type pain in my pelvis and back but that's it. We are now at home with our little bundle of perfection and I'm loving my new role as a mammy. I can't get enough of him, I get so excited whenever he wakes up because that means it's playtime! Everything he does fascinates me! My hormones however are all over the place and I've already cried my eyes out to Craig telling him I don't want Flynn to get bigger because then he won't make those cute noises when he sleeps anymore (yes he did remind me he is barely 48 hours old), and just realising how much I love him reduces me to tears as well, I can't help it. It's all a bit overwhelming at the moment.Overall I think I had a pretty positive birthing experience, even though it did hurt and yes, it's true that all reservations go right out of the window during childbirth - I've decided to spare you the gory details but it's pretty much impossible to come out the other end of labour with your dignity still in tact! But it was all worth it to get the end result, a beautiful, perfect little baby boy!

Saturday, 1 June 2013

(Out of shot is the marshmallow tree and chocolate fountain - I've made myself ill from eating so much of it, it was sooo good though haha!)

I knew my friends and family would throw me a good party but I was honestly so overwhelmed by how much effort and thought everybody put in! Mine and Craig's mam hosted it together and it's the first grandchild for both of them so it was extra special.

This is the 'game station' as I quickly nicknamed it, we had quizzes, a baby-food testing game (which I opted out of - I feel sick enough as it is without tasting pureed concoctions), baby bingo and a measure the bump contest. My friend Alex got the measurement of my bump spot on! With prizes, samples and beauty demonstrations with the option to buy nobody left empty handed!

(I haven't had the heart to cut this cake yet, it's too cute)

And then came the presents! I can tell a lot of thought and effort went into all of them. I was trying so hard to wait until Craig came back because I thought maybe we should open them together but I cracked towards the end of the night haha.

Now all that's left to do is wait for bambino to make his appearance into the world! So if I disappear off here and social networks for a while, it's probably because I've popped!